Jazz Quotes · Page 49

“Twist a tongue, and tongue a twist how many twists can a tongue twister twist around the twisting tongue.”

— Jazz Feylynn

Starting in the middle of a musical sentence and moving in both directions at once.

— John Coltrane

I love dancing, actually. My mother taught children's dance, ballet, tap, jazz...I'm very flexible.

— Michael Angarano

All of us '60s pop stars came from old cities which had a jazz club, a folk club, a coffee house, and…

— Donovan

We're not going to play the blues anymore. Let the white folks play the blues. They got 'em, so they can keep…

— Miles Davis

I don't ever consciously change gears when I play jazz or classical. It's all music.

— Andre Previn

I compulsively reach for perfection in music, often at the expense of everything else in my life.

— Stan Getz

You could be my son. You even look like me a little bit... Say, who's your mother?

— Fats Waller

Jazz is not just music, it's a way of life, it's a way of being, a way of thinking. . . .…

— Nina Simone

Charlie Parker was the greatest individual musician that ever lived. Every instrument in the band tried to copy Charlie Parker, and in…

— Gary Giddins

Basketball, unlike football with its prescribed routes, is an improvisational game, similar to jazz. If someone drops a note, someone else must…

— Phil Jackson

A lot of young people want to become jazz singers, but there are not more jam sessions like there used to be.…

— Dianne Reeves

After the war, once the bop revolution had taken hold, there were all kinds of young musicians, talented young musicians, who were…

— Gunther Schuller

The "Highway 61" album [of Bob Dylan] was produced by Bob Johnston if I'm not incorrect. And Bob Johnston was an entirely…

— Al Kooper

When I was a kid, you listened to a certain genre. Now it's like, "I love indie rock, I love hip-hop, jazz,…

— Jonathan Rhys Meyers

The jazz clubs wind up having only rich tourists - the kids can't come. If they do, then they spend their entire…

— John Scofield

Through the dark days of legalized segregation and on into the civil rights era, jazz shone as a beacon for achieving interracial…

— Randy Sandke

I think of my life as divided between a lot of different periods. I grew up in the country, but as I…

— Reed Krakoff

I think all of us begin as writers. I wanted to be a writer from the time I as eight, long before…

— Gary Giddins

Business today is all about improvisation, which is the essence of jazz. Perhaps in the past we could just follow the operating…

— Josh Linkner

"Poetry" refers to the quite challenging and quite resistant sets of words put together to be admired and interpreted by people who…

— Stephen Burt

When I was a young teenager, it was all about The Clash for me and that sort of English punk stuff. Then…

— Greg Kurstin

Jazz at Lincoln Center is something that is very necessary for the creative process. There's a couple of brothers running around New…

— Wayne Shorter

The music has gotten thick. Guys give me tunes and they're full of chords. I can't play them...I think a movement in…

— Miles Davis

I usually listen to surf music, not much instrumental music, and when I was younger I listened to jazz.

— John Hughes

The human being receives the pleasure from music, not from the argument over what it is.

— Ornette Coleman

Jazz is really 20th-century fusion music. You take West African harmony and rhythm, mix with European harmony, and boom!

— Christian Scott

I was never that big a rock-and-roll, rock guy. I really preferred jazz, you know, that kind of thing.

— Robert Barry

There are editing procedures for talks just as there are editing procedures in jazz improvisation.

— David Antin

It's always Jazz. You can put a new dress on her, a new hat, but no matter what kind of clothes she's…

— Lionel Hampton

My other friends are in music relaxation class, which I do not attend, because smooth jazz makes me angry sometimes.

— Matthew Quick

Jazz has endured because it doesn't have a beginning or an ending. It's a moment.

— Robert Altman

I could do without 'cool' publications calling me 'mom jazz.' But I laughed all the way to the bank, baby.

— Norah Jones

I got my first set of drums when I was around 3. I went from band to marching band to Latin jazz…

— Jeremih

The umbrella of jazz is so big and so wide . If you don't like saxophone, try a vocalist, if you don't…

— Gregory Porter

At a time when individualism is becoming an endangered species, jazz represents a celebration of the individual.

— Ellis Marsalis, Jr

One of the greatest attributes of jazz, I think, is that it is that open.

— Herbie Hancock

I always say that the problem with jazz accessibility is not the content of the music, it's people's ability to access it.

— Esperanza Spalding

I like jazz but actually I didn't love it enough to study it for four years. It was boring.

— Tom Misch

'Amores Perros' is rock, '21 Grams' is jazz, 'Babel' is an opera, and 'Biutiful' is a requiem.

— Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu